Switzerland's fourth-quarter current account surplus widened to 15 billion Swiss francs ($16.25 billion), 6 billion higher than in the same quarter of 2021, the Swiss National Bank (SNB) said on Wednesday.

"Primary income (lower expenses surplus), goods trade (higher receipts surplus) as well as services trade (lower expenses surplus) contributed to this increase" the SNB said in a statement.

In the fourth quarter, Switzerland's reserve assets declined to 852 billion Swiss francs from 873 billion francs at the start of the quarter, as the central bank sold 28 billion of its vast FX reserves. ($1 = 0.9228 Swiss francs) (Reporting by Tristan Chabba, Andrey Sychev, Anastasiia Kozlova in Gdansk, Editing by Miranda Murray)